Word Origin & History

commonality late 14c., "a community," from common (q.v.), as if from L. *communalitas. A respelling of commonalty (late 13c.). Meaning "the common people" is attested from 1580s; that of "state or quality of being shared" is from 1954.

Example Sentences for commonality

And a death so unlike that usually meted out to criminals, as he himself to the commonality of men.

Oh, I envy the lot of the commonality in the Rational State!

Teacher's Pet might be dowered with all the virtues, but we of the commonality would have none of them.

The other commonality this stretch of road shared with Detroit was the obesity of the people she passed.

His disdain for the commonality of life still dictated his prejudices.

The commonality of Venice imagine themselves free, because they are permitted to do, what they ought not.

This great body of the commonality was to a remarkable degree still very purely Punic even in late Roman times.

It is remarkable as having spread into the legendary history of all countries, being still credited by the commonality.

Men may be blind as bats—they usually are; and our Brown is worse than the commonality.

There is an old proverb of our country—‘Better the head of the commonality than the tail of the gentry.’